Senate Health Care Shell Game

From The Heritage Foundation:

According to the Associated Press, at the direction of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Senate Democrats are plotting to pass a bill, by as early as next week, that grants doctors a $247 billion increase in Medicare fees over a decade. This will no doubt add to the deficit. Why are the Democrats so intent on spending $247 billion in one week? To pave the way for the White House to claim that Obamacare is deficit neutral.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and Senate Democratic Leadership are meeting, as you read this, behind closed doors with White House staff . They are trying to cut and paste the complex provisions of the Senate Finance Committee health bill (the Baucus Bill) and the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions bill ( the Kennedy-Dodd bill). They want to produce an overhaul of one sixth of the economy under federal control that is somehow coherent and yet not add “one dime,” as President solemnly promised, to the deficit.

The bill is known as S. 1776, the Medicare Physician Fairness Act, and supposedly is set for cloture today. So, yes, once again, you need to take time out of your day to call your Senators to make sure they don’t do something deceitful behind our backs. At the very least, we can let them know we’re watching.